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Decreased expression of microRNA-125a-3p upregulates interleukin-23 receptor in patients with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis

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Abstract

Interleukin IL-23 receptor (IL-23R) is increasingly recognized as a key checkpoint in autoimmune diseases, including Hashimoto’s thyroiditis (HT). However, the molecular mechanisms regulating IL-23R expression are still unknown. MicroRNAs have emerged as key regulators of various biological events via suppressing target mRNAs at the posttranscriptional level. In this study, we found that the IL-23R mRNA expression was increased in peripheral blood mononuclear cells from HT patients, and there was a positive correlation between the level of IL-23R mRNA and the serum level of anti-thyroglobulin antibody (TgAb). The miR-125a-3p expression was decreased and inversely correlated with elevated level of IL-23R in patients with HT. MiR-125a-3p inhibited IL-23R expression through directly targeting 3′untranslated region of IL-23R. An inverse correlation was observed between the level of miR-125a-3p and serum level of TgAb. Furthermore, we also found upregulated IL-23R expression and downregulated miR-125a-3p expression in thyroid tissues from HT patients. Taken together, our results indicate that decreased expression of miR-125a-3p was involved in the pathogenesis of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education (Grant No. 20133227110008), Health Department Foundation of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. Z201312), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 31470881, 30871193), Specialized Project for Clinical Medicine of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. BL2014065), Science and Technology Support Program (Social Development) of Zhenjiang (Grant Nos. SH2013040, SH2014039), Medical Science and Technology Foundation of Jiangsu University (Grant No. JLY20140004), Graduate Student Research and Innovation Program of Jiangsu Province (Grant Nos. CXZZ13_0700, KYLX_1074), Jiangsu Province “333” Project, Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions.

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The authors have no financial conflicts of interest.

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    Authors and Affiliations

    1. Department of Laboratory Medicine, The Affiliated People’s Hospital, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212002, Jiangsu Province, China

      Huiyong Peng, Jun Yang, Yue Zhang & Shengjun Wang

    2. Institute of Laboratory Medicine, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Laboratory Medicine, Jiangsu University School of Medicine, Zhenjiang, 212013, Jiangsu Province, China

      Huiyong Peng, Jie Tian, Jie Ma, Xinyi Tang, Ke Rui, Huaxi Xu & Shengjun Wang

    3. Department of Endocrinology, The Affiliated People’s Hospital, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212002, China

      Yingzhao Liu

    4. Department of Nuclear Medicine, The Affiliated Hospital, Jiangsu University, Zhenjiang, 212001, China

      Chaoming Mao

    5. Department of Pathology, Centre of Infection and Immunology, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China

      Liwei Lu

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    1. Huiyong Peng
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    Correspondence to Jie Tian or Shengjun Wang.

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    Huiyong Peng, Yingzhao Liu, and Jie Tian have contributed equally to this work.

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    Peng, H., Liu, Y., Tian, J. et al. Decreased expression of microRNA-125a-3p upregulates interleukin-23 receptor in patients with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. Immunol Res 62, 129–136 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12026-015-8643-3

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